History

Founded in 1909, FC Viktoria Stendal was dissolved in the aftermath of World War II and re-established in Soviet-occupied East Germany in 1945 as SG Stendal-Nord. The club underwent a number of changes in quick succession. It was re-named Blau-Weiss Stendal in 1948 and then SG Eintracht Stendal in April 1949. By year's end Eintract was merged with two railway sides – BSG Reichsbahn Stendal and BSG RAW Stendal – to emerge briefly in December as SG Hans Wendler Stendal. The practise of honouring industry in the worker's state through the re-naming of football clubs was common in East Germany. Hans Wendler was an engineer who developed a method for using dust from the country's plentiful supplies of low grade brown coal to fuel older locomotives and so was briefly honoured by having one of the railway-sponsored football sides named after him. The team was finally dubbed BSG Lokomotive Stendal in 1950.

Lok spent most of the 50s and 60s in the top flight DDR-Oberliga. However, they were a perennial lower-table side and their best ever result at that level was a fourth place finish. They fell to the second-tier DDR-Liga in 1968 to play out the 70s and early 80s. Most of the rest of the 80s was spent in third and fourth division level competition.